Euronews Mülakat (İng.)

Turkish opposition says  on EU, Turkey should be more European

Interview with: Onur Oymen to Euro News

September 2009 – Issue : 851

On a recent visit to Brussels to meet with MEPs the Vice-President of CHP (Turkey’s main opposition and social democratic party) Onur Oymen, former Ambassador to NATO and Germany took some time out to speak with Alia Papageorgiou at his party’s representation office to the EU overlooking the Rond Point Schuman. He commented on Turkey’s accession process, the EU and what his party sees as the resolution to the Cyprus and Kurdish issues. He also stressed some facts about Afghanistan. The conversation that followed is below.

A report was released today (September 7) by the Independent Commission on Turkey  claiming that the European Union institutions have completely stalled Turkey’s accession process and that this is harmful to the future business climate of the EU, Martti Ahtisaari, Chair of the Independent Commission, former  President of Finland and the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate has said that fierce opposition from some European politicians combined with a growing public resistance to further enlargement, has deepened resentment in Turkey and slowed the necessary reforms and that the EU must simply follow through on previous commitments to keep the path to membership open; no new promises are needed, do you agree with this statement?

 Yes. The majority of member States and the Parliament support Turkish membership. However, Mr Ahtisaari is one of the few politicians who made such an honest, right-to-the-point comment. Indeed some negative attitudes coming from some countries slow down the process of membership of Turkey, and damage the reputation of the European Union in the World and in Turkey. One of the results of this is that popular support of the Turkish public for EU membership is diminishing. In fact, six – seven years ago this support was 72 percent, today it is only 32 percent. Such negative attitudes come perhaps from the internal problems of the EU , such as domestic politics in some member countries. But it creates a lot of damage in our relations and also influence Turkish public opinion negatively. This is clearly in contradiction with the EU’s global credibility, interests and values.

So you would say that the whole process has stalled then due to national politics not the EU institutions themselves?

Well some politicians want to get votes from their public claiming that they are against Turkish membership. They claim that  there’s no danger to see Turkey as a member as long as they oppose it.. They use Turkey’s accession as an internal political matter. All such information is, of course, reflected in the Turkish press and the Turkish public is fully aware that Turkey’s issue is exploited for internal political reasons in Europe.
Your trip to Brussels today stems around the European Parliament and its new makeup?

Quite often we come to Brussels to maintain our contacts because the more we understand each other the more we will be able to explain the realities of Turkey and understand their concerns and find solutions. Turkish membership is a matter of priority for my party, CHP. As social democrats, we have been supporting Turkish membership from the beginning, so it is our duty and goal to work in this direction.
How far away do you think that direction is?

Well, unfortunately as Mr Ahtisaari says some chapters are blocked. Some are blocked on the grounds that the Cyprus problem has not been solved. Other chapters are blocked by France alone, which say that those chapters may lead Turkey to membership. So it’s an open hostility of the French government against the accession of Turkey and its people, which is absolutely unacceptable. And it’s unconditional. That is to say,  French government does not say that Turkey may join the European Union under this or that condition. This also creates a serious blow to traditional Turkish-French friendship and cooperation. It also creates a lot of reactions in the Turkish public against France. Not only France but the leading coalition partner in Germany, CDU is also reluctant to accept  Turkish membership. This also creates a problem between Turkey and Germany. These negative attitudes do not only affect negatively the Turkey-EU relations, but also our bilateral relations and the feelings of our people towards the EU in general and towards these countries. Moreover, because of these politicians without vision, the EU is seen by the rest of the World as returning to the darker periods of its history.

As a contrast, President Gul seems to be very present in the public eye internationally. What does the governmental position in Ankara have to say about chapters closing? What is the focus in terms of the EU?

He has a talent of talking with everyone -be it Americans, be it Europeans, or Iranians, Palestinians, Israelis, Iraqis in the way they are willing to hear.… In reality there are very different opinions between Americans and Iranians for instance. Europeans and some radical elements in the Middle East have different opinions. You cannot agree with all these groups on everything. Sometimes the position of the Turkish government creates problems because when you promise something you create a climate of hope and optimism, but if you cannot deliver what you promise it creates disappointment. That’s what we are facing very often on the Cyprus issue and fighting terrorism in Iraq. Those are our main concerns. There are a lot of issues where the government promises something, but unable to deliver.
CHP is in favor of peace and cooperation between Turkey and Armenia. Apparently the Turkish government conducted confidential talks with Armenia for two years starting in 2007. They initiated two protocols; there are a lot of chapters in this protocol but the most important point is that the government promises to open the border between Turkey and Armenia. So far all Turkish governments have said that the border is closed because of the occupation of 20 percent of the Azeri territory by Armenia creating one million displaced persons. Therefore to reopen the borders, Armenia should retreat from all occupied territories including Nagorno-Karabakh as said the Prime Minister Erdoğan in Baku in front of the Azeri parliament on May 14. However in the protocol there is no reference to Nagorno-Karabakh or a possible retreat of Armenian troops from occupied territories. 

The Kurdish issue?

CHP is in favor of the solution of the problems of our citizens of Kurdish origin. The individual rights of our citizens of Kurdish origin should be in line with the European standards. We first released a comprehensive report 20 years ago and at the end of the last year again in a very comprehensive program of the Party we repeated our views particularly on cultural freedoms, social reforms and economic stimulus measures. CHP wants a Turkish Republic which has no ethnic or religious discrimination or policies. This is a social democratic and secular approach. Now the government says that it will start a process for solving this problem and asks the support of political parties, without telling to us and to the public the content of its plan. What are they planning? What’s their project? We don’t know. We, as an opposition and social democratic party, have expressed our roadmap on the issue of ethnic freedoms that we consider a richness of our society. We have also presented our views on how to solve the terrorism problem, on how to develop the region. But so far, the government has been unable to present any concrete ideas.
What are your thoughts, through your background in diplomacy and NATO ambassadorship on the resolution of the Cyprus issue?

The Cyprus issue should be resolved through talks between the two parties. There were a lot of talks in the near past on the basis of  UN’s Kofi Annan plan. Although we had some serious concerns about this plan Turkish Cypriots approved it in a referendum that  was also supported by the EU. Nevertheless the Greek-Cypriots rejected it. Now Mr Christofias said that the Annan Plan is dead. That’s to say what they are seeking is an agreement which would be better for Greek Cypriots  than the Annan plan, which means that is worse than the Annan Plan for Turkish-Cypriots. Our government had stated that the Annan plan was our bottom line and we could not go beyond that. Under these conditions how can we solve this issue? There has been some recent pessimistic analysis from the British experts and others. They ask what would happen in case of failure. Nobody can wait until eternity for a successful end to these talks. Therefore  the Greek-Cypriots should finalize their position and try to find a mutually acceptable solution with the Turkish-Cypriots. If a new plan satisfies the expectations of the Greek Cypriots, then it would obviously not be acceptable by Turkish-Cypriots. At this point we do not have many reasons to be optimistic on Cyprus, but we hope that reason will prevail and at the end of the day there will be a positive outcome.
How do you see the Afghanistan issue today?

NATO’s involvement in the beginning was a limited commitment. It was different from Kosovo operation of NATO. In Kosovo the NATO Council was conducting the war. It planned the concept of operation and the rules of engagement. At that time I was a member of  NATO council as Turkish Permanent Representative and I know how we conducted that war. We were taking basic decisions leaving the micromanagement to the NATO commanders. The end result was very successful, very positive. We won the war with zero causalities and a minimum level of collateral damage. Whereas in Afghanistan the operation started as an American led operation of the coalition of the willing. NATO had an additional or supplementary role. In the beginning we were in charge of the protection of the Kabul and Bagram airfield. The rest of the operations elsewhere were conducted by the US and some fellow member countries.  Today NATO is slightly more engaged, but still it does not have the full responsibility of the operation. NATO is engaging troops, taking risks without having full control of the situation. That’s the problem. We as Turkey, commanded ISAF twice, that is to say  the NATO troops in Afghanistan, but at the end of the day you notice that we do not control the political decision-making system. I believe that NATO should have full responsibility, command and control, and accountability for the operations. Now we see a lot of civilian casualties and an incredible amount of collateral damage. People in Afghanistan think that NATO is responsible. This is also one of the reasons explaining why the European Union needs to be a stronger political actor. For these and other reasons Turkish membership will be a great contribution to Europe not only in economic terms, but also in terms of security.